Coup Militias in Yemen Exploit Relief Convoys to Traffic Arms

Reports came in on Saturday on Houthi militias fighting in an insurgency alongside armed loyalists backing ousted president Ali Abdullah Saleh taking over relief and humanitarian aid convoys of the World Food Program (WFP).

Convoys were taken in several Yemeni provinces, in what is believed to be a part of a larger arming plot underway.

Stolen trucks will be used to supply militiamen with weapons and explosives in addition to them being used for means of transporting armed men to battle zones, said the Saudi Press Agency.

Sources inside Yemen said that Iran-aligned Houthi militias have on multiple occasions resorted to seizing convoys, as well as 200 other vehicles carrying relief materials allocated to 12 directorates inside the province of Taiz.

At least 7 registered locomotives deployed to province of Hajjah carrying relief materials for displaced people have also gone missing.

Sources pointed out that Houthi criminal militia forcibly change convoy drivers, and then replacing content of relief materials with weapons and ammunition.

Other sources suggest that WFP trucks are being used to transport armed militants to besieged fronts in Taiz, Abas, and Medi, using the convoys for camouflage.

More so, the Saudi King Salman Center for Relief and Humanitarian Aid said on Tuesday had also announced that three of its trucks suffered a damaging explosion en route to distribute food aid in the city of Marib .

In 2014, a group of Iran-backed Houthi militiamen joined forces with pro-Saleh loyalists in a coup aimed at a toppling constitutional authorities. Ever since, the country has descended to chaos as Yemenis are being brutally displaced in a highly hostile environment.

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